Saturday, November 28, 2015

J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S, Lewis, The Great War and This Present Darkness

In the wake of the Paris and Beirut
attacks, it is easy to feel a darkness descending. What hope is there when
people are willing to do such terrible and heinous things to others?

If there is any comfort in history, it is
in knowing that we are not the first to feel this way, or go through this
experience.

Two men who experienced the worst that humans can do to each other
were J.R.R. Tolkien, author of theLord
of the Rings,and C.S. Lewis,
who wrote theChronicles of
Narnia.

Both men were soldiers in the British army
on the western front in World War One. Tolkien participated in two attacks, in
July and October, 1916, including one where he was in combat for 50 straight
hours.

On November 8 of that year, he was sent to hospital with trench fever.
He never returned to the front—which probably saved his life.

Lewis enlisted in 1917, arriving at the
front that same year at the age of 19. He was wounded in April, 1918 and sent
back to England to recuperate. He also never returned to the front.

The war had a profound impact on both men.
Four of Lewis’ closest college friends died in the fighting. At war’s end,
all but one of Tolkien’s closest friends were dead.

The war also influenced their writing.
Reflecting on his experience years later, Tolkien said his taste for fantasy
was “quickened to full life by war” and that the mythology that becameLord of the Rings“first began to take
shape” during the fighting.

Scenes from the war found their way into
the books. For example, it was common to see bodies of dead soldiers floating
under water in shell holes—something recreated when Sam Gamgee sees dead men in
the water during his passage through the marshes.

Said Tolkien about that scene: “The Dead
Marshes and the approaches to the Morannon owe something to Northern France
after the Battle of the Somme.”

The Hobbits themselves were influenced by
the ordinary British soldiers—the “Tommies”—that Tolkien encountered.

In a
letter written after his trilogy was published, Tolkien wrote that Sam Gamgee “is indeed a reflection of the
English soldier, of the privates and batmen I knew in the 1914 war, and
recognized as so far superior to myself.”

After the war, most authors wrote savagely
and cynically about the end of progress, morality and religion—how could there
be a God after such a horror?

What distinguished Tolkien, a Catholic,
and Lewis, an Anglican, from other writers who experienced that war was how
they emerged from it with a sense of hope and faith. Their books showed that
evil and darkness were not the last words.

As Laconte put it: “In Middle-earth and Narnia, the ruin or redemption
of every person depends on what side he or she has chosen in the conflict . . .
the heroic figure is the one who resists evil, who is willing to lay down his
life for his friends.”

After the attacks, many wonder what they
can do in response. Prayer is one thing, as is doing any small deed of kindness
for others.

But maybe another thing is to read (or re-read) the works of
Tolkien and Lewis—not for escapist fantasy from the world, but to be
reminded that good and light can overcome evil and darkness in the end.